Hexanoate-Cucurbit[7]uril: Highly Soluble with Controlled Release Ability

Current drug delivery systems gain more functions with increased complexity. With the idea of less is more, we synthesized hexanoate-cucurbit[7]uril (CB[7]C₅ COONa) with multiple promising features for drug delivery. The hexanoate group integrates multiple functions. It endows CB[7]C₅ COONa extremely high solubility of over 600 mg mL^-1 and well-defined pH-controlled release ability without sacrificing on the high binding affinity of CB[7] cavity. Based on the pH-controlled release ability, CB[7]C₅ COONa can be used for controlling the bioactivity of drug molecules. We anticipate that the strategy of function integration would be useful for the design of simple yet powerful drug delivery systems.